


somehow we've come to this

by barelyprolific



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Bosko Knows, Canon Compliant, Canon Relationships, Canon-Typical Violence, Emotionally Repressed Eddie Diaz, Episode: s3e05 Rage, Gen, Internal Monologue, M/M, Missing Scene, Multiple P.O.V., Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pre-Relationship, Toxic Masculinity
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2020-12-28 19:57:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21142331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/barelyprolific/pseuds/barelyprolific
Summary: "Hey, where's Eddie?""He said he had other plans."





	1. words all sound like noise

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure where this is going, exactly, but I do know the journey Eddie is on right now has inspired me.

“Hey, Diaz!” 

Instinct left over from his military days has Eddie’s head jerking up and around to find the source of the call. Bosko jogs over to him from the truck she’s been stocking, a smile on her face. 

“Bosko,” he greets, goes back to the careful polish of the bumper of his own assigned vehicle. He misses the way her face scrunches up, the slight eye roll.

“I just heard the news. Your buddy’s coming back.”

Eddie feels his shoulders stiffen, deliberately keeps polishing. She can’t mean what he thinks he means. “My buddy?”

“You know. The one you _ fought _ with in the grocery store.” 

The urge to ask Bosko what she means by the way she says ‘fought’ is one Eddie barely manages to smother. There’s a tone there, the same tone in Chimney and Hen’s expressions whenever Eddie brings Buck up, lately.

Not that he mentions Buck more than anyone else does.

He doesn’t.

What Eddie does do, in that moment, is choke out a, “What?” 

“I guess you’re not the only one with legal luck on their side this week. Wilson says he dropped the suit in exchange for his job back.”

Bosko hovers for a moment, shuffles her feet and shoves her hands in her pockets when he doesn’t look up. Eddie has gone still, though, staring at his reflected face in the metal bumper. He practices schooling his expression into something deliberately blank. 

“Tonight, there’s that team-bonding thing the Cap’s set up… Wilson says Buckley will be there…”

Eddie grunts, starts polishing again with force. “I’ve got other plans.”

“Right,” Bosko drawls. “Plans.” Her voice is doing that weird thing again. Eddie still isn’t interested in looking. 

“So,” she continues, moving to sit next to Eddie. “You and Buckley…”

“Me and Buck what?” Eddie demands, those words ones he can’t quite stop. His jaw clenches, eyes flashing when his gaze jerks up to meet hers. Challenging. 

Bosko’s eyes narrow, hands sliding out of her pockets to settle on her thighs. Before she can reply, the alarm starts blaring. A call.

As Bosko turns away, Eddie breathes out a sigh--of frustration, of relief, of--he isn’t sure what. For just a moment, he lets his head hang, heavy with a weight he doesn’t want to acknowledge.

Then he stands up and goes to work. 


	2. the ole fatal flaw

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Buck is coming back.

_ Buck is coming back. _

He drops Christopher off at Abuela’s with a hug and a kiss, avoids his grandmother’s face as the lie about an extra shift trips off his tongue. She gets a kiss too, and a thank you. Her palm is smooth and cool against his cheek when she pats it. 

“I’m worried about you, _ Papito_,” she tells him. “Where is your friend? The one who’s so good with mi Christopher?”

“Buck is,” Eddie starts, falters. “Buck’s busy.” 

_ Buck is coming back. _

Eddie laces up his sneakers with deliberation, pulls tight and rocks his ankle to test the pressure. The last thing he needs is a shoe flying off.

_ Buck is coming back. _

The fact that he had to hear it from _ Bosko_. That she knew before he did. Eddie takes a deep breath, jumps a couple of times and shakes out his arms. She doesn’t know Buck. She doesn’t know anything about Buck.

_ Buck is coming back. _

The fist connects with the side of Eddie’s face and his head snaps back. He grunts, stumbling, nearly falling. Just manages to catch his balance. It hurts, but Eddie’s felt worse. Felt so much worse the pain almost feels good.

Good, Eddie thinks. Clear, simple. He gets hurt, he hurts back.

It carries the same sort of satisfaction as the wounded look on Buck’s face when Eddie reminded him of Christopher. A little too sharp, almost painful; pressing down on a bruise.

_ Buck is coming back. _

There’s blood in his mouth. The taste is metallic, overwhelming. Eddie spits it out, wipes his jaw. The grin he wears is more a red-smeared grimace as he shouts his rage, charging his opponent. He feels the body under his hit the ground, hears the sick smack of his knuckles slapping skin, hitting bone beneath it.

For disappearing on him. For betraying his trust. For making Eddie count on him, getting under his skin, making Eddie care, making Eddie _ need _ him--

\--They have to pull him off, but Eddie doesn’t care. He’s won.

_ Buck is coming back. _

Tomorrow, he’ll be ready.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eddie, Eddie, Eddie... That is not the way to deal with your problems. 
> 
> Let me know what you think!


	3. work it out like business

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Of course Buck noticed Eddie was hurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What am I doing with this? Where is this going? I don't know.

Of course Buck noticed Eddie’s arm. 

Buck’s awareness of Eddie shouldn’t have come as a surprise to him. Neither should the fact that he said something. Eddie forgot somehow, in the short time he’d been gone, just how much attention Buck could pay a person. That’s just how Buck _ is. _

Eddie swears to himself, avoids making eye contact with Hen as they ride to the call. Everyone else, Hen included, that asked Eddie about his injuries had bought his roughhousing with Christopher story without question. Now he’s worried that with Buck’s big mouth back at the station, she might decide she has some. 

He blames exhaustion for the fact that he’d been unprepared for the sight of Buck walking towards him, despite knowing he was coming back. If the lie hadn’t been one he’s been using all week, Eddie doubts he would have come up with a story, he’d been so unprepared. Hearing Buck’s voice, calling out to him like everything is fine.

Except nothing is fine, and it’s Buck’s fault.

“Eddie,” Hen’s voice interrupts Eddie’s brooding, and he looks at her. “You look exhausted. Did you get any sleep last night?”

“Did any of us?” Eddie snaps back, and Hen’s eyebrows go up. “Knowing Buck’s back today? I know I wasn’t looking forward to seeing him after what he did.” 

Hen exchanges a look with Chimney that Eddie doesn’t get, and that bothers him too. She had been with Buck when he approached Eddie, and Chim had greeted him.

“Then again, maybe you don’t have as much of a problem with it.”

“No, I don’t,” Hen says, just as shortly. “Buck might have screwed up, but he did it to get back to us, and he was feeling betrayed at the time. That why matters just as much to me as the what.”

“Personally, I just want things to get back to normal. Like it or not, without Buck around, nothing felt normal.” Chimney’s voice cuts into the tension between Hen and Eddie, and they both look at him. He shrugs. 

Before the conversation can continue, the truck is pulling up to the scene and they have to get to work. Eddie’s grateful for the distraction, for himself and for the rest of the team. He doesn’t want to hear Hen and Chimney talk about Buck not being around, or being back around, or about Buck at all.

Buck, who is undoubtedly pouting back at the station over being left behind, waiting with those sharp blue eyes to notice all the little details about Eddie no one else cares about.

All the things Eddie just wants to keep hidden. 

So no, he hadn’t been looking forward to Buck coming back.

He’d dreaded it.

**Author's Note:**

> Comment, yo, and tell me all about it. Whatever 'it' may be.


End file.
